Friday, March 6, 2026

Weekend Steam: 1915 Triple Expansion Engine

 Merle spotted a beautiful 1915 vintage triple-expansion marine engine that resides in a museum. It's turning, but no steam.  This engine replaced the original engines in the 1863 ironclad, HMS Scorpion. It's a beautiful piece of machinery.

And, here is an operating triple expansion engine in the SS Jeremiah O'Brien, one of the two surviving Liberty Ships from World War II.  About 200 of these engines are sitting on the ocean floor.

1 comment:

John in Philly said...

That's an awful lot of up and down to get the props to go round.
The only reciprocating steam machinery that I worked on was the fire and bilge pump in the engine rooms of my two cans.
The Boiler Techs had the same pump and they also had a reciprocating main feed pump.
Richard McKenna's book "The Sand Pebbles" goes into great detail about operating and overhauling the San Pablo's main engine.